


Ser Jag Allt Så Klart

by irisesandlilies



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: (sort of), Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, Happy Ending, M/M, Minor Sharon Carter/Natasha Romanov, Non-Graphic Violence, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Self-Indulgent, Stockholm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-09
Updated: 2020-07-09
Packaged: 2021-03-05 02:42:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,484
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25157194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/irisesandlilies/pseuds/irisesandlilies
Summary: Bucky decided that Steve would never really understand or accept the conclusion that Bucky’s bullets, his body, his hands had killed every single one of those people on the pages of those files. Steve would never relinquish that long-dead person he held in his heart, that wore Bucky’s face and spoke with his voice.Bucky needs him to see, some desperate and sadistic part of him wants to pry that image of the smiling kid in uniform from Steve’s mind the same way Hydra had stolen Bucky’s recollections of a delicate but feisty little blond.That unyielding desperation of Bucky’s is what takes them back to Europe, retracing their steps, retracing the labyrinth of Bucky’s crimes.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Comments: 3
Kudos: 15





	Ser Jag Allt Så Klart

**Author's Note:**

> ...aka, let me take you to all the places I did awful things so you can tell me you love me anyway! 
> 
> Du och jag nu (you and I now), du snälla vänta, vänta, håll ut (please wait, wait, hold out), tio tusen meter upp i luften ser jag allt så [klart](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xcoG8mSfTMY) (ten thousand meters up in the air I see everything so clearly) 
> 
> well, basically this started as me thinking about how we never got a proper cap 3 and how much I miss Stockholm. I lived/studied there for a while so this started out as a self-indulgent love letter to the city with some stevebucky?? it evolved into some emotional stuff with too much detail about Stockholm. Most of it’s true including the assassination so I tried to be mindful of that. 
> 
> unbeta'd, all mistakes are my own
> 
> heads up for canon typical violence!

When Bucky finally agrees to come back with Steve, he had Bucky caught in a grimy hostel room in Varna. It’s really more fair to say that Bucky had caught Steve, leaving a vague trail for him and Sam to follow across Europe. Steve knew they would never find his beloved ghost unless he wanted to be found, but they pursued each scrap of a clue Bucky left because Steve would have readily died chasing him. 

They were both posed in attack ready stances, feet set wide and arms raised. Steve was the first to lower his guard because something about the husk of a man countering him always made Steve’s heart break and his fists fall to his side. Steve had catolouged and committed to memory every little detail about the moment Bucky’s stance crumbles, his shoulders slumping when Steve murmurs, _“Come home.”_

When Bucky lets himself be wordlessly led from the Bulgarian coast and back to the city he remembers from a life before he never attempts to conceal any bit of himself from Steve, but there’s a lot he can’t fathom the words to describe. 

Steve’s conviction was unremitting, even as Bucky tossed him bits of his past over his shoulder as he snaked across Europe. He fed the Blonde agent and the familiar fiery-haired woman fragments of intel, each bit worse than the last in an attempt to break Steve’s resolve. Steve’s conviction never wavered and Bucky eventually decided that Steve would drive himself mad with the chase before Bucky could ever convince him of any impurity. So he resigned and waited in Varna. 

It had been different than running from handlers, eventually abdicating his freedom and waiting for recapture. It was different because Bucky felt the plea Steve offered stir something in his animated corpse that made his surrender feel voluntary. 

No matter how horrifying the bits of intel Bucky had offered, regardless of the numerous files Steve had read, he had still begged Bucky to go back with him. 

Bucky decided that Steve would never really understand or accept the conclusion that Bucky’s bullets, his body, his hands had killed every single one of those people on the pages of those files. Steve would never relinquish that long-dead person he held in his heart, that wore Bucky’s face and spoke with his voice. 

Bucky needs him to see, some desperate and sadistic part of him wants to pry that image of the smiling kid in uniform from Steve’s mind the same way Hydra had stolen Bucky’s recollections of a delicate but feisty little blond. 

That unyielding desperation of Bucky’s is what takes them back to Europe, retracing their steps, retracing the labyrinth of Bucky’s crimes.

—

Bucky’s breath comes soft, measured little exhales against Steve’s neck. Each slow breath pushes Bucky’s lungs towards his, his chest swelling against Steve’s heart.

Bucky’s arms are curled around Steve’s waist, mismatched fingers pressed into the small of his back and keeping Steve pinned against him. 

Steve’s nose is pressed into the strands tucked behind Bucky’s ear, his right hand cradling the back of Bucky’s head and keeping his face close to his skin. 

Steve has one ankle hooked around Bucky’s calf and the other drawn up so that his knee rests against Bucky’s hip. 

When Steve shifts his face slightly, his cheek catches on the stubble along Bucky’s jaw. 

Steve hums contentedly and Bucky draws an unconscious finger along the path of Steve’s spine. Steve runs his palm along the hard lines of Bucky’s side, outlined in delicate skin and scars. 

The sheets draped over their naked torsos are coarse and vaguely scented with bleach. 

Cool morning air seeps through the cracked window, spatterings of early morning rain pinging softly against the glass. 

Steve nuzzles against Bucky’s hair and murmurs something against the white noise that sounds vaguely like, “I love you so much,” and his steel-blue eyes are fluttering open as though those words would always rouse him from wherever his mind rest. 

His hooded eyes glow in the clouded dim sneaking into the room, his mouth unmoved, but a slight glint showing in his face. 

All he can manage is a sleepy, affirmative hum, his mouth moving against the corner of Steve’s lips. 

Steve attempts a laugh that shapes itself as more of a hard exhale, turning his head just slightly to catch Bucky’s plush, agape lips. 

Even sodden with sleep Bucky kisses him back hard, teeth prying at his bottom lip, working Steve’s mouth into a swollen, wet smile. 

“Where are we?” He asks in a hoarse whisper, fixing an unmoving gaze on Steve’s face as he drags his palms along the lines of his back. 

“Still in Stockholm.” 

Bucky offers a weak nod, pressing his lips to his face. He misses Steve’s mouth just slightly, his lips landing on the crease beside his mouth showing with his grin. 

“Big day ahead.”

Bucky makes a soft sound, catching in his throat like a groan in response. 

Steve pulls his other knee upwards, giving him the leverage to lean forward and scatter kisses across Bucky’s face. Bucky leans into his touch, tangled hair whispering against his skin. 

“We don’t have to keep doing this.” Steve murmurs against his neck.

Bucky gives a quick shake of his head.

—

It was a political assassination in the late 1980s that brought Sam and Steve to Sweden once before.

Sharon was standing in her warmly lit living room, the time on the wall nearing noon but still clad in pajamas. 

She had reached toward the coffee table strewn with various papers she had snuck from work and presented him with a file on Olof Palme. With a flicker of a grimace seizing her sweet face she says, “big critic of Soviet foreign policy.” 

Natasha who was hovering behind Sharon, encircled Sharon’s waist in her arms, resting her chin on the blonde’s shoulder and directed her piercing gaze towards Steve “in the back, close range, Soviet slug.” 

Natasha’s new cover after she’d blown them all herself was apparently a CIA agent’s girlfriend. 

_She had continued to insist that Steve call the not-nurse, not-SHIELD agent until Steve bitterly replied, “if she’s so nice why don’t you date her?”_

_Natasha’s mouth took a defiant quirk before she crossed her arms and shrugged, “maybe I will.”_

The matched set of spies had been Sam and Steve’s biggest aid in the tireless search for The Winter Soldier— or whatever was to be recovered of Bucky Barnes. 

He had thanked them for the file and soon found himself beside Sam on a seemingly endless train ride from Arlanda airport to Stockholm city center. Steve had kept his eyes fixated on the countryside, as it zipped past at nauseating speed.

—

They ride the train three stops from Slussen, the first stretch of the ride extending across the restless dark sea.

Bucky’s leg is bouncing listlessly as his eyes follow the passing tunnels translating in flits of light and the distant, dull roar of the tracks. Steve sits in the seat beside him, closest to the aisle, his eyes shining as he regards Bucky with urgent and persistent fervency. 

“I love you.” Steve always says it so simply, a phrase that weighs nothing on his tongue, but everything on his heart. 

Bucky nods quietly in response, eyes still fixed on the window. Steve catches glimpses of his reflection there, and there is a desperation in his face that Steve mistakes for exhaustion. The lines set in his skin tell of the agony that the years of running and pining brought on his soul. 

Steve extends an assured hand to Bucky’s knee to still his restless movement. His fingertips glance the inside of his thigh, warm and devastatingly intimate. 

“Breathe.” Steve reminds him softly, his hand tightening momentarily in a promise. 

Bucky looks to Steve, eyes round and mouth drawn in a frown. Steve tips his head and watches Bucky exhale the tension held in his chest in response to the gesture. 

The bright, programmed voice chimes with the warning of the next stop and Bucky draws himself to his feet, following his repeatedly mapped path towards the exit doors. Steve reaches to clasp his hand, nimble fingertips sweeping his flesh wrist into an inseparable grasp. 

Steve watches as the green-tiled station washes into view. Across the ceiling of the platform area stretches an array of fluorescent lights, arranged in a non-sensical, aesthetically pleasing pattern. Somehow the crisscrossing arrangement reminds Steve of the paths he and Sam had traversed across the continent, searching for the man beside him. 

Steve lets himself be dragged along the platform, placid and quiet. He would’ve followed Bucky anywhere— he had, across Europe and years earlier when he had aimed the Valkyrie towards the ocean. 

When they exit the underground it’s apparent how wrong the setting is, birds singing overhead, the light fragrance of blossoms saturating the air, the warm sun on their skin. 

Steve can feel Bucky tremble where his hand cradles his flesh limb. Bucky’s face is set in bitter determination, an expression that has become so familiar to Steve. 

“We don’t have to do this, Buck.” Steve repeats wearily, as he feels his steps resound across the concrete. 

Bucky’s voice wavers when he counters through gritted teeth, “I need you to see this.”

—

What Bucky remembers of that night is this:

Waiting, brick grating against leather. He felt the street seem to narrow until it appeared more like an alleyway. There was something so agonizingly familiar about alleyways, but the solider could never place it. 

The weather was a relentless cold that saturated the bones he’d forgot he had. It was the same cold carried across the sea from the place that made the soldier. 

He remembers his targets passing, huddled together and he remembers the odd ache in the space of his chest. 

After he sheds the cover of shadow, aims his barrel at the back of the unsuspecting man and pulls the trigger back towards himself, his recollection blurs. 

It’s tatters of red, fragmented screams. A second shot, the slap of his boots across the pavement and up the steps. 

He doesn’t remember the punishment he endures afterward for the surviving target, only reading it in Russian files years later.

—

Bucky’s knelt at the plaque placed in the stone. His gloved hand is splayed across the corner, just covering the word _mördades._

Steve decides this is worse, worse than most of the places they’ve revisited from the soldier’s past. It was usually a rooftop, a decaying building, so few of the soldier’s hits were apparent at all. Time forgot so much of the blood, most spots never saw flowers decompose or candles burn away. 

Steve stoops beside Bucky, placing one hand on the small of his back, reminding him with the subtle touch that he was here with Steve, he was human. 

Bucky knows Steve’s read the file, stood with Sam at this spot before but he reiterates what he can summon of the slaying anyways. 

Steve moves his touch from Bucky’s spine to wrap his arm around him, urging him close and memorizing the hard lines of Bucky’s left side pressing against him. 

Bucky’s eyes are gleaming when he turns to search for some indication of understanding in Steve’s face. 

Steve returns Bucky’s worried scrutiny, Steve’s eyes are sullen but telling of his realization with a soft smile he wears not on his mouth but in the twinkle of blue. His lips graze Bucky’s forehead, breath close and warm. 

“I’m not that kid you remember anymore.”

Steve feels the statement clatter around the space between his lungs, “I know.”

—

The stand on the stretch of bridge between the royal palace and parliament, the prime minister’s residence looming slightly behind them.

Along the railing of the bridge, people have left locks tethered to the metal, an attempt to anchor themselves or their relationships in time. It amuses Steve, he is an anchor in time. 

Throngs of people pass, lavishing in the late sun. The area is favored by tourists and it provides an easy cover for the pair. 

The air drifts gently, rifling the Baltic as it winds through the city. 

Steve studies the way Bucky’s delicate blue eyes absorb the sunset, his eyelashes gracing his cheeks when the clouds shift and a ray of sun catches his face. 

The wind whips Bucky’s hair into a dance, and Steve reaches to gently section it behind his ear. 

“You know I’m always saying that it wasn’t you. All the things they made you do weren’t you.” Steve poses it more like a statement than a question. 

Bucky nods, a stiff, brief movement. He keeps his gaze set in the distance, towards the bright lines of patina copper and red of Sankt Jakobs kyrka, nestled just beyond the opera house. 

Steve’s mouth contorts into a quiet smile, tugging at the corner of his lips. _Saint James._

Steve reaches for Bucky’s left hand, prying his fingers out their fist shape and lacing them with his. 

“I want you to know, even if they were you, even if you had chosen to do those things it wouldn’t change how much I love you.” 

Bucky finally meets Steve’s stare, his face wavering with inexplicable emotion. A crease furrows his brow and he tips his head slightly. It was the same face he had always worn when he found Steve bleeding in an alley somewhere. 

“You don’t mean that.” 

“Yeah, Buck, I do.” 

Steve has spent so long attempting to separate the two characters in his mind, his best friend and the soldier. It occurred to him as he watched the pain settle on Bucky’s face as he knelt before the plaque that they were woven together. No matter how hard Steve tore at the threads.

Steve also realized in that moment, as Bucky looked up at him with red, pleading eyes just as he did in every city and past crime scenes before that, Steve didn’t care. 

He had loved him even when his fists pummeled his face. 

It was the same way Bucky loved Steve when he was small and tripping over Bucky’s feet as soft music played in their bedroom, and still loved him when he was Captain America, looking away as Bucky fell instead of diving after him. They were the same people and they weren’t at all. Bucky loved them both. 

Bucky inhales heavily, like the act of taking in air to sustain his lungs somehow still hurt. 

They had been in a silent standoff all this time, Bucky trying to place some kind of hatred for him in Steve’s heart, and Steve trying to convince himself that Bucky was still that boy that lived without knowing war. 

Bucky’s fingertips tighten around Steve’s hold, “You know I love you too?”

Steve nods. 

Everything had changed. They had changed, somehow their love changed with them.

**Author's Note:**

> Stockholm’s Tbana/metro stations are all decorated in different ways, it’s basically the world’s longest art installation. It’s really cool. Anyways Steve and Bucky rode from Slussen to Hötorget. Hötorget isn’t even one the coolest stations but google it and you’ll see the light arrangement is pretty cool!
> 
> At the end, they’re standing on a footbridge on Drottninggatan (Queen Street) which is a touristy but beautiful spot lol. 
> 
> Sankt Jakobs kyrka = Saint James’s Church 
> 
> mördades = murdered 
> 
> The title is from Jag Kommer by Veronica Maggio, I changed the title because that song is so soft and fit this perfectly
> 
> tack för att ni läsa!!


End file.
